About US

+ Medway’s Leading Swimming Club

Black Lion Swimming Club is the principal competitive swimming club in Medway and a leading club in Kent, England.

+ Historic Medway

Medway is located on the River Medway and has a long history dating back thousands of years. Some of the historic features that can be appreciated today include; Romans roads, the Norman Rochester Castle, Rochester Cathedral (the second oldest in Britain), and the Chatham Royal Naval Dockyard with its associated defences.

+ Our History

The Club was first established circa 1887, as Gillingham Invicta Swimming Club, training at the Strand Open Air Lido.

In 1891, the club held its championships at the pier in Gillingham. Races were a little different in those days and included the 100 yards in clothes! In addition to medals, prizes included a folding chair, penknife, shirts and box of cigars!

Over 40 years ago, the Club moved its principal training ground to the Black Lion Sports Centre (now named Medway Park). The club subsequently embraced the name, becoming Black Lion Swimming Club, and adopted the black lion symbol as our trademark logo.

+ 'The Black Lion'

‘The Black Lion’ has as strong symbolic relationship with Medway’s heritage; local knowledge suggests the name was derived from a Blacksmith’s established in 1719, which was responsible for providing metal works to the nearby Royal Naval Dockyard. The blacksmiths was directly associated with the area where the Sports Centre was built, and became the influence for the name chosen.

The Black Lion symbol represents the Strength required in both the Blacksmith and his finished work, and more widely in Heraldry is used to denote Courage. Both these attributes exemplify our swimmers and represents what is needed to help them succeed.

The club continues to use Medway Park, previously Black Lion Sports Centre, as its principal pool but now accesses 3 additional pools in the Medway area allowing us to support swimmers locally as well as further afield. Our swimming squads range from novices training for an hour per week, to senior swimmers who are swimming at regional and national level, who potentially can train in excess of twelve hours per week.

+ Our Aspirations & Philosophy

We currently have around 250 members with swimmers accessing our swimming programs from our Swimming Academy, to our Competitive Squads, as well as our Masters programs. We have swimmers competing at all levels from local galas up to National Championships.

Our philosophy is to nurture our aspiring swimmers to develop and progress to their full potential becoming the best swimmers they can be. Inspiring and supporting them to believe in themselves and achieve their goals and dreams, as well as supporting a lifelong pathway into sport.